Technique du coup d’État
One of the copies printed for the press.
Presentation copy inscribed by Malaparte to Drieu la Rochelle: “à Drieu La Rochelle, en très sympathique hommage. C. Malaparte. Paris 24 juillet 1931.”
This was the second of Malaparte’s books to be translated in France.
Having joined the Fascist party, Curzio Malaparte went on to denounce its excesses: L’Italie contre l’Europe in 1923, then Monsieur Caméléon in 1929, already provoked violent controversy with the party’s leaders. In January 1931, however, Malaparte left the party. Technique du coup d’État was his first work written as a free man, and one of only two books he published in French during his stay in Paris at the invitation of Jean Halévy. Although Denis Saurat, the critic for La NRF, dismissed it out of hand — “A book full of ill intentions, which alone do not make literature, nor even coups d’État. It proves the opposite of its title: that every coup d’État is different, and that there is no technique that can serve them all” — the book contributed to Malaparte’s international fame. In 1933, in reaction to Hitler’s rise to power, he circulated his Technique throughout Europe. He was then in London, posted as a political correspondent, when the Duce ordered him to return to Italy, and had him arrested upon arrival. The book was, unsurprisingly, banned in both Italy and Germany.
Slight wear to the wrappers, otherwise a good copy with a fine provenance.